Book of Revenge (Bloodshot Salvation #1 Comic Review)

Bloodshot is gone! No longer is Ray Garrison going to assume the guise of the killer Bloodshot. He has decided to settle down with his wife and their new daughter and live out his life in peace. I mean this is comic books right? What could possibly go wrong? Backstory Ray was a former soldier turned killing machine. This was the result of the US Government injecting nanites directly into his blood stream. His Nanite-Active Blood gives him a veritable laundry list of super human abilities including:Super Strength, a Healing Factor/Regeneration,enhanced speed, agility, reflexes and endurance, Shape Shifting, and Cyberkinesis.He can change his appearance to a completely White body with a Bright Red spot on his chest. So if you are keeping track, secret Origin Nanite Injection.Ray is retired with his wife magic and his todler daughter Jesse and his Dog that miraculously is stark white with a single red patch over it’s eye.

What just Happened:

This story opens with a scene that is very similar to the recent Marvel film Logan. A girl about seven or eight years old, is walking in the snow in the deep woods of Minnesota.We notice that she is pale of skin, not sickly but she matches the fallen snow around her, and has two blood red eyes. She turns to find that she has been surrounded by men in ski masks.She springs into a frenzy that would make for a good Quentin Tarantino script. The men have all but captured her, all that have not been killed in her wake, and then a solitary shot is fired. Mom, shows up in the nick of time to save her daughter, but the problem remains. They found us again.

The artist shifts here to a flashback with the Cover artist Lewis LaRosa. I really liked his art, but past that the scene staging and framing is set up so this reads like a movie. I am watching an action movie about a guy with these nanite powers. So if you have one takeaway it should be that Bloodshot Salvation reads like an action movie.

We get into some exposition of the plot and it delves into some plot development that seems to set up a villain from the past for Ray’s Wife magic. She was on the phone with someone that really upset her. Ray, is worried, since they are in hiding, and while she goes to take a nap he takes her phone and we see him transform into Bloodshot to pull the information out of her phone. He takes his invasion of privacy very serious, and goes a step further and dials the number.To find a creepy fellow on the other side who asks about his daughter.The plot thickens!Ray is confronted by his wife with”You promised to never be Bloodshoot again!”.

We now see the other person on the line at his farm,as some very official government looking vehicles approach. “You’re 23 min Late”, he says.

Looks like Daddy’s got some juice with the Government kids. I smell a conspiracy brewing.

The art switches back to the beginning artist Mico Suayan. He has a very detailed style and it is a definitely darker tone in the first and last parts of the book. We now see Jesse and Magic on the run from someone or something.The story has not told us, but we see the Mood is that of desperation.There is an explosion in the Car they are driving and as Jesse Pulls herself out and goes to help her mother, a character that looks very similar to Bloodshoot reaches down and extends his hand.” Uncle Rampage has come to take you home.”

Final Thoughts:

As I said this book reads like an action movie, and in that vein it fall to the trappings of it’s genre. We have several plot lines in development as we are introduced to our protagonist and his family, and it doesn’t take long to figure out that the goal of the bad guys is to get a hold of Jesse. Bloodshot is a fun read, it seems like a good starting point for those who are looking to get into the character.I having been familiar with him from the early 90’s days of Valiant comics was delighted to see him finally get the artistic interpretation that the early years of Valiant comics so desperately lacked.Visually the art and colors really are working for me.The writing is a slow build and is planting some seeds for us that will hopefully bear some fruit throughout the series. Over all a fun character to follow, and as I said it’s basically an action movie. Ending on a cliffhanger in a classic comic style.I liked it overall, but telegraphs the plot a bit and the family drama and exposition was a bit slow, but I like that I get an idea that the character is torn about using his powers.